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When people are ill, they usually either make a doctor's appointment or lie in bed and wait it out. Pharmaca Integrative Pharmacy has created a third option. Visits to its stores, which are scattered across the western US, are more casual than a doctor's visit but less passive than bed rest. Each location's team of health experts, including credentialed pharmacists, naturopathic doctors, herbalists, nutritionists, and more, consult with customers?no appointment needed.
But Pharmaca aims to serve its customers every day, not just on sick days. Its stores have been drawing droves of clients since 2000, partly because they meet so many needs in just one spot. In addition to a full-service pharmacy, Pharmaca offers organic and food-based vitamins from MegaFood and New Chapter; professional-grade skin care and cosmetics from Jane Iredale, Sanitas, and Dr. Hauschka; and therapeutic-grade supplements from Metagenics and Thorne Research. Customers can also choose from an assortment of homeopathic remedies, herbal formulations, medical supplies, toiletries, gifts, and fair-trade chocolates.

The piney scents of douglas firs, white firs, and scotch pines waft through the grounds of Summit Christmas Tree Farm, an 80-acre farm located just east of Highway 17. After finding a tree of the right size and height, customers take part in a time-honored holiday tradition: chopping it down with tools provided by the farm. All that chopping can work up an appetite, which is why the Cub Scouts operate an onsite snack shack.

Dream Dinners founders Stephanie Allen and Tina Kuna want to help families gather around the table for delicious meals. Like many parents throughout the country, the two women tried to coordinate a family dinner, but their efforts were often thwarted by hectic schedules. As a dinnertime strategy, Stephanie began to prepare meals with fresh, raw ingredients and then freeze them so they could be quickly thawed and cooked during the week. This tactic became popular with her family. Before long, friends, friends of friends, and chimpanzee families that mimicked their friends wanted to learn her secrets. With help from Tina Kuna, she established the first Dream Dinners location, and the successful food-prep business has led to the creation of more than 90 stores in less than three years.
At each Dream Dinners location, customers find all the culinary tools to prepare a nutritious meal—everything from fresh ingredients to meal-packing materials. Each week Dream Dinners features a new menu of fix-and-freeze dinners that can be made for up to six people, providing customers with numerous options for planning quiet meals at home or dinner parties with friends. All ingredients are precut and measured to ensure an error-free fixing.

At Smile Center of Los Gatos, Dr. Ginnylee Roderick personally polishes grins with an expansive slate of general dentistry and cosmetic services, drawing upon more than 16 years of experience. Muted spotlights illuminate a warm, contemporary waiting area with a bubbling aquarium that entertains patients and then lulls them to sleep. During appointments, low-radiation digital x-rays and intraoral cameras help scout out problem areas as electric handpieces expedite decay removal and a CEREC machine speedily molds crowns, inlays, and veneers. Painless teeth-whitening sessions can take place at home or in the office, and Dr. Roderick also checks in on gums with periodontal services, sometimes giving patients eggs fresh from her own chicken coop to hard-boil and then test-drive newly cleaned chompers.

Whether setting long locks into romantic curls, lightening a pixie cut to an edgy blond hue, or coloring hair with cotton-candy pinks and lavenders, Paige Chand is prepared to give clients a style that suits their personality. She performs both cut and color services as well as semi-permanent straightening treatments and special-occasion styling for a wedding or half-marathon. She pulls from the salon's high-end collection of professional haircare serums, which includes styling products from Kevin Murphy, Pureology, PRIV?, and Ecru.

Almaden Valley Aesthetics? medical director, board-certified plastic surgeon Dr. Agheg M. Yenikomshian, leads a team of medical aestheticians and registered nurses that never perform exactly the same a procedure twice. The professional staff specializes in procedures including skin tightening, fraxels, photofacials, and cellulite reduction. Those looking to minimize the appearance of wrinkles may also enlist their expertise in administering facial fillers, collagen builders, and Dysport or Botox injections. In addition to its catalogue of medical services, the team also tailors non-invasive beautifying services
to each client?s specific needs, whether they are minimizing stubble through laser hair removal or rejuvenating faces with various peels. Microdermabrasion treatments buff away dead skin while spa-style facials can hydrate skin, infuse pores with Vitamin C, or address common teen skin imperfections such as acne and drivers-ed notes jotted on the forehead.

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Buying, preparing, and eating produce from the farmers' market is nutritious, supports the local and organic movement, and is good for the environment. But it also alleviates the mundane weekly grocery store run to a much more enjoyable experience. The farmers' market is a place for discovery, for meeting and conversing with farmers, and for tasting things to tickle your tastebuds.
Visiting the farmers' market can be part of the weekly grocery store rounds, or it can be a once-in-a-while sensory experience focused on tasting samples of more savory and baked goods.
San Francisco is fortunate enough to have multiple, year-round farmers' markets available, each with its own local growers and food finds.
Here is a list of 5 Year-Round Farmers' Markets in SF:
Ferry Building Farmers' Market
Ferry Plaza (One Ferry Building, SF) | Every Tuesday, Thursday & Saturday | Year-Round | Tues/Thurs 10a-2p & Sat 8a-2p
This waterfront farmers' market has over 120 food and produce vendors, and provides breathtaking views of the bay bridge. The Ferry Building, which is already a foodie-heaven of artisan shops and gourmet food, gets turned into a food mecca by the farmers and local growers when the market is open. A must-visit, whether to taste the savory cooked foods, or to buy fresh, local, organic produce.
UN Plaza Farmers' Market
UN Plaza (1182 Market St., SF) | Every Sunday & Wednesday | Year-Round | Sun 7a-5p & Wed 7a-5:30p
Located in the heart of the city, this award-winning market is known for its affordable prices. This bazaar is committed to bringing local, sustainable food to San Francisco's urban communities. With over 50 farmers and almost 20 hot food and specialty item vendors, it is definitely fulfilling its mission.
Mission Community Farmers' Market
Mission Community Market (Bartlett St. & 22nd St., SF) | Every Thursday | Year-Round | 4-8p
Located in the Mission District, this is a community-oriented market that takes place rain or shine (with just a 6 week break for winter). They are so much more than just a farmers' market -- offering after-school programs, performances by local musicians, dance classes, and a "play street" for kids. A non-profit organization that relies on community support, this farmers' market is aiming to change the community by promoting economic security and family health.
Noe Valley Farmers' Market
Noe Valley Ministry Parking Lot (3861 24th St., SF) | Every Saturday | Year-Round | 8a-1p
Run entirely by community volunteers, this market was organized in response to the closing of a nearby natural foods store. The market is organized around three principles: 1) Build Community, 2) Provide Healthy Food, and 3) Support a Vibrant Local Small Farm Economy. Stroll into the market on Saturday mornings and find organic fresh-squeezed juice, grass-fed beef, honey, bread, pastries and pies, almonds, dried fruit, Indian, Nepalese and Mexican food, and of course - locally grown produce.
Alemany Farmer's Market
1000 Alemany Blvd., SF | Every Saturday | Year-Round | Dawn-Dusk
The Alemany Farmers' Market, also known as "the people's market" and the "granddaddy of all farmers' markets," is the oldest farmers' market in the Bay Area. Founded in 1943, this market is affordable and historic, as farmers' have been selling there for 2 and 3 generations. With colorful stalls and free parking, this market has a home at the crux of many vibrant SF neighborhoods and has a warm, community feel.

Beyond the occasional vegan or lactose-intolerant eater, San Francisco is more or less united in its adoration of cheese. Whether an ordinary cheddar slice to melt atop an omelet or an artisanal offering meant to be paired with wine and charcuterie, the city has a hankering for the stuff, with plenty of quality cheese shops for cheeseheads to pick their favorites.
Anyone headed to Dolores Park is sure to make a pit stop at Bi-Rite, the upmarket grocer nearby that offers an impressive array of quality cheeses to choose from. But for those trekking to Golden Gate Park, there is Cole Valley’s Say Cheese. With a sizeable assortment of wine and sandwiches, it’s as great a spot for rarities that challenge the taste buds as it is for standards like Vermont cheddars or Swiss Gruyeres. And it’s likely much less crowded than Bi-Rite.
For almost twenty years, Cowgirl Creamery has been brightening up one of the foggiest places in the country: Pt. Reyes Station, California. Fortunately for the mist-averse, they have a shop in the Ferry Building as well, where cheesemongers in white coats hawk wheels and wedges to moneyed urbanites. The fast-paced Ferry Building location is the perfect place to grab a spread of incomparably buttery, triple-cream Mt. Tam.
Or, if you’re in the right neighborhood, head to Mission Cheese on Valencia for flights of hard to find but easy to remember cheeses. The moody shop doubles as a romantic sit-down restaurant and looks a swirling blend of cheese cave and trendy, poured-concrete loft. There’s no better place to order a raft of unfamiliar American artisan cheeses, with some light fruit accompaniment and a glass of wine or two. Just be sure to take notes; proprietor Sarah Dvorak seldom stocks the same thing twice.
Noe Valley’s 24th Street Creamery is a true cheese-lovers paradise, with lots of lactobacillus on hand to give ripened cheeses their signature funk. Some options come creamy, others retain their hard texture, but nearly all offer a bit of beautiful stink, meaning the shop – which stocks roughly 300 cheeses – is one of the city’s finest, if stenchiest, spots to shop. Look for the large array of vinegars, caviars, honeys and chocolates as well.
Owned by a Lebanese-American couple, Cheese Boutique in Glen Park is one of the linchpins that make that neighborhood such a treasured urban village. It’s an old-school enclave, but this small outpost proudly displays a run of gourmet pastas, house-made hummus and hard-to-find British products like Marmite, as well as dozens and dozens of cheeses. Cheese Boutique enjoys a large local following, showing just how dedicated San Franciscans are to their love of all things fromage.